


A House That Makes a Home

by viiemzee



Category: Carmilla (Web Series)
Genre: Alternate Universe, Half Way House, Multi
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-12-25
Updated: 2015-02-13
Packaged: 2018-03-03 14:03:01
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 4,719
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2853437
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/viiemzee/pseuds/viiemzee
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Birthed from an idea with my LGBTQ+ society friends, Carmilla inherits a mansion-esque house after the death of her mother. Struck by an incident involving a teenage boy who had just come out and needed a place to spend the night, the gang open their house to any one who might need it.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Introduction

At twenty five years old, Carmilla Karnstein had thought she had her fair share of issues in her life. Coming out to her mother had been an adventure, as well as an unnecessary burden; watching said mother die in a hospital bed wasn’t the best of experiences either. When her younger brother Will went to live with their Dad, she thought that being lonely was going to be the only emotional state she’d ever feel again.

And then she met Laura Hollis.

Carmilla Karnstein experienced true love, and for a while she was very happy. It was undeniable that Laura made her happy, and that anything about the girl affected her. Even Laura’s oddball group of friends were enough to make Carmilla crack a smile or two on occasions. She grew to like them, and her love for Laura only grew as the days went by.

It could be said that it was Laura’s love for Carmilla that helped her finally look through her mother’s will.

At twenty seven, and two years after her mother’s death, Carmilla Karnstein inherited a house that had been hers for two years already.

* * *

“Move in with me.”

Laura giggled sleepily, moving her head and bumped her chin against Carmilla’s forehead as the other woman nipped at her neck, breathy kisses punctuated by grazing teeth.

“Mm?”

“Move in with me.”

“Carm, I already _do_ live with you. This is your apartment, remember?”

Carmilla laughed against her girlfriend’s throat and rose up to meet her eyes, her lips fluttering across Laura’s cheeks as she sat up to stare at the girl lying next to her.

“Into Maman’s house.”

Laura didn’t speak for a bit, and silences from her journalist girlfriend always terrified Carmilla. She ran a hand over her face, up to her hair, sweeping it out of her face and looking away from Laura, to the darkest corner of their room.

“I mean, it’s big, and it’s mine, and we don’t have to pay rent, and we can live there together and it’s a nice neighbourhood and it has a garage and everything. We could buy a car, or a motorcycle, or a couple of bikes or whatever.”

“Yes.”

Carmilla fought back the biggest grin she’d ever felt grace her face, and turned back to Laura, hugging her close to her, breathing in her smell.

“Yes,” Laura repeated into Carmilla’s hair. “That sounds awesome.”

Loneliness wasn’t much of a perpetual state, it seemed.

* * *

They lived in the house for a month before they realized it was too big for them to handle on their own. With ten large bedrooms, three bathrooms, a dining room and a kitchen the size of Carmilla’s old apartment, and a backyard big enough to be called a park, Laura was pretty sure the ‘house’ was more of a mansion.

(But what did she expect when her girlfriend was the daughter of one of the most prestigious authors of the twenty first century?)

She brought up the idea of roommates over dinner one night. Carmilla didn’t look too convinced until Laura said that Danny needed a new place to stay since she couldn’t pay rent at her old place, and she’d help keep the house clean anyway, and she’d be able to pay Carmilla some money for letting her live there.

After that, Carmilla looked very unconvinced.

Two nights later, she agreed, on the condition that LaFontaine and Perry joined them in the house too.

Laura reminded her the two had just gotten married, and wouldn’t that be a bit awkward for everyone involved?

Carmilla just looked at her and shrugged.

She liked their company regardless.

* * *

A month after their friends moved into the house, Perry’s cousin came out to his parents. In a state of shock and anger, the poor boy was kicked out of his home. Crying, he had called Perry. Hysterical, she had LaFontaine drive her to the city to pick him up. Within the hour, he was sitting in front of Carmilla’s fireplace, nose dripping everywhere, a heavy Persian blanket wrapped around him.

In her twenty-seven years on Earth, Carmilla had never seen someone so helpless and desperate for shelter.

Two nights later, the boy was taken back by his parents (who apparently needed some time to adjust to the news) and Carmilla held a House Meeting.

House Meetings weren’t uncommon. They happened once every two weeks, and almost always ended up in everyone getting drunk at the table; if she was feeling particularly generous, Carmilla would share her stack of weed too. This particular one was serious. Carmilla looked everyone in the eye, one by one, reached out for Laura’s hands across the coffee table, and smiled at her.

“I have an idea.”


	2. Chapter 1: Queer Friendly

The bronze plaque on the front of the door gleamed, newly polished. It was a sunny day, and _The Karnstein Hostel (Est. 2014)_ was already displaying an ‘Open’ sign swinging from the doorknob. Underneath the plaque, a smaller, even shinier sign showed, two simple words creating a bubble of hope for anybody who needed it.

_Queer Friendly._

Giving a shrug, the leader of the group of four standing at the front door took a chance and rang the doorbell. He looked back at his friends, giving them another shrug and sucking in a deep breath. As the eldest, he felt it was his responsibility to do these things. He didn’t like it much.

It was a minute later that the door swung open, revealing a short-cropped, ginger headed figure, holding a cup of coffee.

“Hi, can I help you?”

“Uh, we’re looking for a room or...two, or whatever,” he said, rubbing at the back of his neck nervously, and before he knew it they had been led into the living room and told by the ginger to ‘stay put and wait for the owner of the house’ before disappearing into the house.

“You think this is a good idea?”

“It says ‘queer friendly’ on the front of the house, Leila, of course it’s a good idea!”

“But what if it’s really expensive?”

“Somewhere like this wouldn’t be...”

“Are you kidding me, Dominic? Really? Have you seen the size of this place?”

“Hey, hey, guys, relax. We’ll talk to the owner and see what happens, OK?”

The four voices quieted down, and the door swung open.

A woman walked in, black hair falling over her pale face, looking like she had haphazardly thrown on her clothes (at eleven in the morning), as if she’d just crawled out of bed (at eleven in the morning...), and looking like she didn’t really want to deal with four teenagers. She breathed out deeply, sitting down in the large arm chair opposite the sofa where they had all taken their seats, and clapped her hands together.

“Right, hi. I’m Carmilla Karnstein, owner of the house, manager of the place. The person who greeted you at the door is LaFontaine, they do our books. As you can tell from our sign, we’re a queer friendly hostel and half-way house, providing a safe space for anybody who needs it.”

“How much do we have to pay?”

“How much do you have on you?”

The four strangers before her exchanged quick looks before turning to the eldest of them, who shrugged. “About three hundred bucks between us.”

“How long do you want to stay here?”

“Uh, just like, four nights.”

Carmilla Karnstein looked at the calendar near the door, counting the days, and nodded. “Perfect. That’ll be twenty-five dollars each, food included.”

“Do we pay now...?”

“Later. But before we move on, some House Rules.”

She stood up, using the coffee table as the barrier between them and her, crossing her arms over her chest and semi-glaring down at them.

“Breakfast is from eight until ten-thirty, no exceptions. Lunch is whenever Lola Perry, our cook, dictates it is. The third floor is where staff sleep, and is off limits completely unless invited up by a member of staff – trust me, that won’t happen. Staff is here to help you, and we are ready to listen to anything you want to talk about, but we are not trained counsellors or therapists and can only help so much...”

She continued on, about payment and keeping their rooms clean and the neighbourhood and proper care of their keys when they got them, and they were feeling a little bit like they might have picked the wrong place, purely because this woman was not the sympathetic owner they had hoped to find, when a knock at the door stopped her tirade half-word. 

She frowned slightly, and simply uttered a ‘come in’, not even looking over as the door opened.

A  brunette walked in, hair loose around her shoulders, a tray of small sandwiches and water in her hands. She smiled at Carmilla Karnstein and placed the tray on the coffee table.

“Just thought our new guests could use something to eat,” she explained, smiling sweetly at the teenagers on her sofa before turning back to the other woman. “You need anything?”

“No, Cupcake, it’s fine. Thanks,” she answered, wrapping an arm around the woman and pulling her into a kiss, smiling as if the taste of her lips was all she needed for sustenance, and let her go, watching her walk out of the room.

“My girlfriend, kids,” she gestured, smiling at them. “As if that wasn’t obvious enough. Well, I think we’ve got everything settled. So once you’re done eating what Laura’s prepared for you, join us in the foyer and you can properly introduce yourselves.”

* * *

“So hi, I’m Nathan, I’m twenty-two, and...uh...yeah. I’m gay, I guess, and I think that’s pretty much it.”

The sandy-haired boy poked the companion to his right in the ribs – a pretty girl with blue streaks in otherwise blonde hair - and she screwed her eyes shut before clearing her throat.

“I’m Leila, I’m nineteen and I’m a lesbian.”

The baby-faced boy next to her smiled eagerly at the five adults standing before him and rubbed a hand over the stubble growing on his chin. “I’m Dominic, I’m twenty, and I’m a trans man.” He gestured to the dark girl near him, who was fiddling with her hands, looking at the wall paper adjacent to her.

“I’m Siobhan, but I go by Xiv. I’m twenty-one, and I like guys and girls.”

“Well, Leila, Dominic, Xiv and Nathan...” Laura opened her arms in greeting, still leaning against Carmilla as she did, “welcome to our home!”

The four looked at each other and smiled, looking back at them as Danny started giving out keys to rooms to them, and Perry started rallying her house-mates into the dining room, saying something about lunch being done soon and their new guests looked hungry.


	3. Chapter 2: Runaways

The next day, Perry woke up Laura and Carmilla with a loud banging at the door, and the news that ‘the kitchen is empty, how am I supposed to make a proper breakfast that our guests _paid_ for if I don’t even have toast, Mircalla!’

Laura loved the face that Carmilla made whenever someone called her by her birth name. Laura had asked her when she had changed her name to Carmilla, and why, but Carmilla always told her that it was a story for another time. The face persisted as the knocking went on, Perry almost hammering the door down until Carmilla called out a very loud and rude ‘Yeah, yeah!’. The sound of footsteps stomping down to the second floor soon followed.

“I’ll go to the shop,” Laura said from her end of the bed, watching as her girlfriend tried to roll out of bed, the covers clinging to her body instead, making her look like a very cross cocoon.

“No, no, I’ll appease Princess Pep.”

“No, seriously, I’ll go,” Laura giggled, sitting up in bed with an ease Carmilla couldn’t muster on her best mornings, and dressed quicker than a flash. She was leaning over Carmilla’s side of the bed soon enough, kissing the top of her messy black hair and stroking her thumb lightly along Carmilla’s cheek as she cupped her face.

“Go back to sleep, OK?”

“Mmm...” Carmilla purred, and Laura was tumbling down the stairs soon enough, leaving a house of barely-awake teenagers behind as she ran to the supermarket.

* * *

Running to the supermarket may not have been her best idea.

Laura arrived drenched in sweat, slightly red from a combination of the exercise and the sweltering July sun, and completely out of breath. She doubled over the minute the air conditioning hit her face, and she stood at the entrance to the supermarket like that for a solid minute, gasping for air and ignoring the confused stares as people looked at her, hands on her knees, head hanging low.

She whipped herself up the minute she felt her breath return, and grabbed a shopping basket, strutting her way confidently through the shop.

She made it all the way through five aisles without a hiccup, filling the basket with food (she thought) they needed, before coming across the girl.

She was standing in front of the refrigerated section, her hands clasped tightly around a carton of milk and a loaf of bread, staring mournfully at the selection of deli hams before her. Laura thought she looked like she was about to cry; looking around, the girl appeared to be alone. What looked like all her belongings seemed to be stuffed into a large rucksack that was perched precariously on her back.

Sidling closer, Laura approached the girl.

“Hey, there.”

The girl started, staring up at Laura and almost dropping the milk, catching herself before she made a mess.

“Oh, uh, hi.”

“You need any help?” Laura asked sweetly, and the girl looked back at the deli hams quickly before locking eyes with Laura.

 “I...uhm...”

For a second, Laura was sure she was talking to a scared rabbit rather than a teenage girl, who looked like she was going to bolt at any second, but maybe something in Laura’s smile and eyes made the girl trust her, because she visibly relaxed – slumping over slightly – and sighed.

“I don’t have enough money to buy food.”

“Oh, do you need money?”

“I...that would be nice, yeah,” the girl said, her eyes following Laura’s hands as she moved to her pocket, digging for her tiny purse to hand the girl a tenner. She took it cautiously, as if she was afraid Laura would take it away from her before she could grab it, playing a wicked game of ‘Psych!’ with her, but she didn’t.

“Thank you, this is awfully nice of you.”

“It’s OK, dear. We all need a little help sometime,” Laura assured her, keeping her eyes in line with the girl’s, making sure she didn’t look away soon. “Are you going anywhere?”

“I, uh...” and there it was – her gaze was darting again, as if she was trying to find an escape away from this conversation without seeming rude. “I’m...looking for a place to stay. I’m in town a couple of days. Business.”

“Still haven’t found anywhere?”

“Not really. And I need someplace cheap. My budget for staying anywhere is twenty bucks, so I’ll probably end up on the streets.”

“Not necessarily,” Laura said, and the girl raised an eyebrow as she moved a step closer, offering her hand.

“I know a place that’ll keep you for twenty bucks for as long as you need...what’s your name, again?”

“Rachel. My name’s Rachel.”

* * *

“She’s a runaway, Laura!”

“Danny, not the place to judge. You ran away once.”

“Yeah, to my brother’s house across the street, Perry. When I was fourteen. She’s like, nineteen-”

“Twenty,” Laura corrected.

“Fine, twenty, and running away. That never spells anything good out!”

The kitchen was silent apart from the sound of sizzling bacon as Perry flipped it from the pan to a plate, and Danny leaned against the counter, looking Laura and Carmilla square in the face alternately.

“We can’t let a runaway stay here.”

“I’m with Danny on this one,” LaFontaine said, scratching the back of their neck as they spoke. “She might have the cops on her tail, she might have done something bad.”

“Perry, any opinions?” Laura asked the ginger at the stove, who remained silent save for a small ‘hmph’; Carmilla had stayed silent this whole time.

“Carm, what do you think?” she asked, knowing that at least one person would have her side on this.

She was, of course, right.

“She can stay.”

“Carmilla-”

“No, Ginger Squad, listen to me,” she whispered hotly, putting her own hands on the counter and grabbing their attention. “She needs help, and she doesn’t strike me as the type to be a criminal or in serious trouble-”

“How would you know?”

“I would, Lawrence. Now, she’ll stay here, for as long as she’d like, and eventually she’ll tell us what brought her here. Until then, twenty year old Rachel is our guest, clear?”

“Crystal,” came the indignant reply, as Perry dumped scrambled eggs onto a plate in a steaming heap, and jabbed LaFontaine in the shoulder with her elbow.

“Take that out to our guests, would you?”


	4. Chapter 3: Evenings

**7:11PM**

Danny liked the fact that the house was placed in a neighbourhood so safe, she didn’t mind taking jogs after five. She liked that the people living in the houses around them had gotten so used to the house full of women that they were polite enough to give them small nods or waves as they too walked around, either with push chairs or with eager dogs on leashes.

She’d just returned from her daily forty-five minute jaunt around the area, sweat already cooling around her shoulders and back, a small victorious smile on her lips, when she spotted Xiv sitting on the porch, lit-cigarette in hand, staring down at the perfectly mowed lawn (Perry insisted that a well kept house needed a well manicured lawn to go with it). Clearing her throat, Danny approached Xiv, smiling at her as she sat down next to her on the steps, stretching out her legs.

“How you doin’, Xiv?”

“Fine,” she sighed, flicking the cigarette away from her, a small grunt of disgust emanating from her. “I don’t even know why I smoke, sometimes.”

“Very unhealthy habit.”

Xiv laughed, sensing the joke, and shrugged. “Uh, I guess. Started last year, kinda find it hard to stop. Still pretty disgusted by it.”

Danny nodded, wiping at her brow and giving out a long breath. “You should come jogging with me. That might help you quit.”

“Or kill me,” Xiv grinned, stretching out her own legs, frowning at how short they looked compared to Danny’s.

“Ah, come on, fit girl like you, you’ll manage!”

“Huh...yeah, sure.”

Danny turned to look at her, raising an eyebrow, watching as her companion stared at her feet before muttering, ‘Girl...’

“Not too sure about labels there, are we?”

“Is it normal?” Xiv asked, looking up at Danny, and the older woman saw something akin to worry and surprise in the eyes that looked up at her.

Smiling, she nodded, getting up and gesturing to the door. “Really, LaFontaine is better at this stuff than me. They’re...they’ve actually gone through it.” 

“Would...they...be up to talking about it?”

“Most definitely. Let’s go find them.”

Smiling genuinely for the first time since she’d arrived (Danny thought), Xiv followed her into the room on their quest to find LaFontaine.

* * *

**9:30PM**

“Hungry again, Dominic?” Perry smiled as the boy walked into the kitchen, hands in his pockets, smiling sheepishly in that way she thought was incredibly charming for a boy his age.

“Oh, yeah, I’m always hungry lately,” he grinned, shrugging slightly and removing a hand from his pocket, pointing at the bowl of fruit. “Can I have one of those?”

“The apples? Yes dear, if you want! Although, I wouldn’t recommend having an apple before bed.”

“I won’t be going to sleep for a while,” Dominic said as he grabbed an apple and made to bite it, but Perry was quicker, taking the fruit from his hand and running it under cold water.

“You really should wash your fruit before you eat them, Dominic.”

He smiled at her, taking the apple from her when she was done, and biting in gleefully. He was about to say something, but knew that Perry was one of those who didn’t appreciate people talking with their mouth full, and so he swallowed first, running a hand through his hair.

“So, you guys are all friends?”

“Well, we started off as Laura’s friends. But when Laura and Carmilla started dating, Carmilla’s mother died and she inherited the house. We’d been living here for a few months before Carmilla decided to turn it into a half-way house.”

“Awfully nice of her.”

“She doesn’t seem like the kind of person, but she’s inherently good. Deep down, anyway. Very...very deep down,” Perry frowned, looking away from Dominic to put the stack of plates in front of her back into their drawer.

“How about you? Are you all friends?”

“Oh, yeah. We’re all from the same town. I think we’re the only queer people there, actually. We’re just sort of moving around right now.”

“Did you meet at school?”

“You could say that,” he smiled, finishing the apple and moving to the bin, looking at the empty core before throwing it out. “I met them back when everyone knew me as Daria. But...I prefer being Dominic.”

He looked up at her, and before he could flash her another winning smile, Perry had thrown a packet of potato chips at him.

“Taking testosterone makes you hungry,” she stated simply before walking away, saying ‘goodnight’.

Feeling like he had finally found a place that understood, Dominic opened the packet and made his way to find the others.

* * *

**10:30PM**

Truth be told, Laura didn’t really like enforcing a lights out policy, but them being a hostel in a lived-in neighbourhood, they had to have some sort of rules. Also, she knew that Perry wouldn’t take too kindly to people reporting them for keeping the lights on too late into the night, so it was with mild disdain but also a whole lot of understanding that she went around the house telling people that lights off was in half an hour.

She knocked twice on the last door before entering, smiling at Nathan and Leila, who were lying toe-to-head on one of the two beds in the room, talking animatedly between them. They looked up at her as she entered, and she leaned against the door-frame, smiling.

“Lights out in half an hour, so I suggest you wrap up whatever philosophical discussing is happening here right now.”

They looked at each other before looking at her, and Nathan shrugged, getting up to look at her properly. “We were just talking about coming out.”

“Oh, fun!” Laura grinned, stepping into the room and closing the door softly behind her. “Who wants to go first?”

“We, uh...” Leila started, putting a hand to her hair and blushing slightly. “We actually haven’t ever come out to anyone besides our friends.”

“Oh, that’s fine. That’s still coming out!” Laura said, jumping onto the bed next to them and crossing her legs, smiling at each in turn. “You wanna hear my story first, before we talk about it? That’s what we’re here for, you know; talking.”

The two teenagers exchanged brief glances before Nathan nodded. “Yeah, sure.”

“Right. Well, I was sixteen, and there was this really hot girl in my English class...”


	5. Chapter 4: Sweet

It was fifteen minutes to curfew on the second day of their house being full to the brim, and Carmilla was getting used to the sound of the people around the house. They were quiet for the most part, only really making noise when they were out in the yard, and even then they were pretty controlled. She hadn’t caught any of them smoking anything they shouldn’t be yet, though she was considering offering them some pot before they left.

She fished into her back pocket for a lighter and a cigarette, pushing the door open with her foot, not really paying attention to the black mass on the porch, and almost tripped over Rachel as she did.

“Jesus, wha- Oh, Rachel.”

The young adult in question looked up at her, a cellphone clutched in her hand. She sniffed up at Carmilla, who sat down next to her and lit her cigarette, offering one from the packet to Rachel. Hesitantly, the girl took one and sighed as Carmilla lit it for her.

“You OK?”

Rachel shrugged, her lips pursed shut, and in the dim porch light, Carmilla thought her face looked wet.

“Hey, have you been crying?”

She reached a hand up to her face and wiped at her cheeks furiously, shaking her head. “I...uhm...yeah, I have.” 

Carmilla put the cigarette in her mouth and puffed, looking out to the dark street.

“Aren’t you going to ask what’s wrong?”

“I don’t press, sweetie, not unless you want to speak.”

“And if I do?”

“In that case, I’m all ears. Just...I’m not trained for stuff OK? So if you need someone professional, or whatever, I’m not the right person.”

“I just want to talk,” she said, not even paying attention to the cigarette, and Carmilla nodded, turning her body to lean against the porch, crossing her legs and waiting patiently.

Rachel seemed hesitant at first, and the darkness seemed to be setting in a little heavier around them before she spoke, her voice a whisper and light on the small summer breeze around them.

“There’s this girl-”

“There always is,” Carmilla whispered back, shooting her a smile, and Rachel laughed, taking a drag before continuing.

“We’re friends. We’re good friends, but she’s confusing me. I feel like sometimes she’s leading me on, and it just hurts a lot. I’ve just gotten sick of her acting like I’m sort of puppet on a string, you know? And I just...I think I love her? But sometimes I doubt love’s a thing.”

“Why run away from her?" 

“Why do you think?” she scoffed, rolling her eyes.

“I want to hear it from you, Rachel.”

A longer pause ensued, one that felt like the younger girl was weighing her words very carefully, and she sighed, heavily and loudly, before snubbing the cigarette out and looking at the filter as it smouldered out.

“I need to get away from a space filled with her, so I can think.”

“I get that,” the older woman answered, looking up at the sky above them, the summer sky reflecting small pin points of light back down at them. “Sometimes, you love someone so much that being around them is both the best and worst thing that’s ever happened to you. I dated this girl for a while, Elle. She was...everything to me. But time changes, people change, and I just sort of accepted that being around her wasn’t the best thing for me. I mean, I have Laura now, anyway.”

“How long have you guys been together?”

“Little over a year,” she smiled, closing her eyes for a brief moment. “God, I love her.”

She had no idea why she was declaring this to a teenager who barely knew what love was; it probably had something to do with the shining stars.

“I’m just scared that...what if I do love her? But like, really love her. What happens then? What if I’m not the one for her?”

“I don’t have all the answers, cupcake.”

Rachel looked back down at her phone, giving a small grunt of indignation before getting up and saying a brief ‘goodnight’ to Carmilla, making her way into the house.

* * *

“I saw you out on the porch.”

She turned around to look at Laura, already in bed, the sheets up to her waist and her hair flowing around her shoulders, a book in hand.

“Yeah?”

“Yeah. It was very sweet of you, helping that girl out.”

She didn’t say anything, just unhooked her bra beneath her shirt and kicked off her jeans, crawling in next to Laura and planting a small kiss at the base of her chin.

“I can be sweet.”

“Definitely.”


End file.
